He's still got a long way to go and a lot of work to do, but it was a good day.

However, as I'm sure you can see if you know him, he's still very much himself.

It's so hard to articulate the right balance of realism and hope.

This is great.

It was very good to get the call that they all made it home. Best part of Christmas, really.

This is good. I continue to hold Soren and Velma up to the light.

Jane

The current rehab facility is not feeding him well, if we define that as "presenting food that he actually wants to eat" rather than "the plate contains significant amounts of things that can be legally defined as foodstuffs." But he is eating some of the dubious food they're offering, and in these pictures he's at a restaurant with food people actually want and will eat when they have a choice of where to get their meals.

He has lost significant weight, but not to the point where he's problematically thin, as I understand it.

Patrick at #5 is right. There's a long way to go, and he grieves, and is impatient with himself, but he's there, very much so.

He had a great time, and told me that he hopes to see more people this week.

John Scalzi's wife models that t-shirt too; I knew I'd seen it somewhere.

Congratulations, Scraps and Velma! Keep up the good work!

I saw a video documentary of Ram Dass, who had suffered from a stroke shortly before the film was made.

Apropos of the fact that he was having trouble remembering words, he said "Words are the clothing that ideas wear when they go out."

Soren says, "Aphasia -- profound. I cannot talk." He also just told me, "Don't go straight down --zig-zag; it's better."

(Soren says he took half an hour.)

...to go straight down the hill. He typed that parenthetical sentence himself. It took him ten minutes, he says, to type that with one hand.

That's me in Dutch. I find it easy to imagine that in my sole means of communication. Difficult.

But it's good to see him out, about, and happy. Yay Scraps!

I remember being that aphasic, and it gets better for most of us.

Best wishes to him, to his brave and tireless partner, and to all the friends who are helping him along this path.

I'll bet it is tough. I'm glad he's a tough bird, and that he's got good friends in his corner. It's been one small step for him, over and over, and it's nice he could step out for a nice time.

It's hard to explain, but whenever I read about his progress, I feel like I just had a near miss, like a car almost ran me down or something. Keep the good news coming, and thanks for all we've gotten so far. Scrap by scrap, he's coming back.

Patrick @#5: It's so hard to articulate the right balance of realism and hope.

I find "struggles with" and its ilk to be useful for this sort of thing. My sister struggles with aphasia, I battle depression, and so forth. The verb can be changed up or modified as needed to indicate how things are going without directly characterizing the degree of depression, aphasia, etc. I like this phrasing because it puts the focus on the fight; also because it leaves the subject of the sentence unmodified and has a fairly strong verb, and the questing beast is pushed to the end of the sentence.

Continued good wishes and thoughts comin' your way, Scraps and Velma!

Yeah, I know. There's a long way to go still. But, still, yay!

So so good to see these pictures.

I love this man.

Share the Moon and the sense of wonder of being alive together.

Seeing the moon rise with your best beloved FTW.

Scraps here. Anyone want to come hang with me Sunday, maybe take me out for a while, so Velma can have an afternoon off? Buzz her and let her know!

I'm stuck on grand jury duty, which is taking an unbelievable amount of my time and I'm not allowed to say anything about it. I suspect, alas, that I won't be able to come by Atlantis until it's over.

Tip: Never, ever serve on a grand jury.

wow, i'm so glad to see your voice again. my very very best wishes for your recovery, & a fervent hope you can continue to grace us with your textual presence here.

I will be in NYC in a couple of weeks. I'll come see you.

I will note that the books he's asked for are Bridge of Birds (found), Nova (found), and The Einstein Intersection (not found, and there are at least two copies in this apartment, doggonit!). Things are getting interesting.

(He also called me to alert me to the news of the plane in the Hudson yesterday afternoon.)

I just brought the EEE in last night, so I don't know how often he'll be on line -- or even how often he'll want to be on line -- yet, so don't expect immediate responses.

in other words: what really matters is that you guys look hot! keep postin' the photos. xoxo

http://www.deselbybowen.com/parlando/2009/03/10/stroke/